Though Cool in US, March Ranked 10th Warmest for Planet

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In stark contrast to last year, when the continental United
States experienced the warmest March in more than a century,
March 2013 was nearly a full degree Fahrenheit cooler than the
20th-century average, U.S. weather officials said.

Not so for the rest of the planet: Last month tied with March
2006 as the globe's 10th
warmest March since record-keeping began in 1880.

The average of the world's temperatures last month exceeded the
global average for March for the 20th century by 1.04 degrees
Fahrenheit, or 0.58 degrees Celsius, according to
climate data released this week by scientists with the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). And the
three months from January to March 2013 was named the eighth
warmest such period in the past 134 years, according to NOAA's
report.

The month was especially hot in a large interior stretch of
China, with temperatures spiking up to 11 degrees F (6 degrees C)
above the 1981–2010 average for March in parts of the country's
northern and western provinces.

The continental United States, meanwhile, experienced the
chilliest March since 2002, with an average temperature of 40.8
degrees F (4.8 degrees C). Alabama, Florida, Georgia, North
Carolina and South Carolina were actually colder in March than
they were in January 2013, NOAA officials said. Across the
Atlantic, parts of northeastern Europe and western Russia were at
least 9 degrees F (5 degrees C) cooler than average, with the
United Kingdom seeing its coldest March since 1962.

Last year was
the hottest year on record in the contiguous United States
and the ninth warmest year for the globe since 1880. Out of the
world's top nine hottest years, eight have been observed since
the year 2000, with 2005 and 2010 sharing the title of hottest
year on record. Climate scientists have attributed the trend to
global warming caused by human emissions of carbon dioxide and
other greenhouse gases.